We’ve heard a lot in the last few years about organoids, the so-called “brains in a dish” created in labs by neuroscientists. But as with many neuroscience topics, a wide gulf separates viral newsiness from reality. Scientists at Neuroscience 2019, the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience, gathered at a press panel to discuss the latest brain-organoid research, sift through ethical implications, and address where the science is going next.

First, what is a brain organoid?

Simply put, a brain organoid is tissue manufactured in a lab from human stem cells that mimics human brain tissue.

“In the last five years scientists figured out how to turn stem cells into 3D cell structures, and eventually [developed] so-called brain organoids, which look like not only cell types in the brain but also cell architectures,” according to session moderator Hongjun Song, PhD, professor at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine who studies neurogenesis and epigenetics.

That is not, however, the same as saying they are human brains. Rather, organoids […]

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Mass shooting markers
Credit: Apu Gomes/Getty

The stereotype of a mass shooter is a white male with a history of mental illness or domestic violence. While that may be anecdotally true, the largest single study of mass shooters ever funded by the U.S. government has found that nearly all mass shooters have four specific things in common.

A new Department of Justice-funded study of all mass shootings — killings of four or more people in a public place — since 1966 found that the shooters typically have an experience with childhood trauma, a personal crisis or specific grievance, and a “script” or examples that validate their feelings or provide a roadmap. And then there’s the fourth thing: access to a firearm.

Credit: hellogiggles

When he campaigned for president, Donald Trump posed with the rainbow flag and became the first GOP nominee to mention LGBTQ citizens in his convention speech. In his first month as president, he signed an executive order stating he was “determined to protect the rights of all Americans, including the LGBTQ community.”

Yet since taking office, Trump’s administration has acted to dismantle federal protections and resources for LGBTQ Americans, particularly those gained under President Barack Obama.

In a reversal from the Obama administration, the Trump administration has repeatedly taken the position that laws and regulations that prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex do not cover a person discriminated against for being gay or transgender. The administration has also pushed for religious exemptions to civil rights laws, which experts say will make it easier to discriminate against LGBTQ individuals. The administration has taken particular aim at transgender people, barring them from joining the military.

The White House did not respond […]

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Credit: Getty

Trans children who live as the gender they identify with act and develop similarly to their cisgender counterparts, according to a new study.

In the largest ever study of transgender children, scientists recruited 317 3 to 12-year-old transgender children, 189 of their siblings, and 316 cisgender kids who acted as controls. The transgender participants had socially transitioned, meaning they were living as the gender they identify with rather than what they were assigned at birth. For instance, a child with a penis assigned a boy at birth who has come out as and is living as a girl.

To conduct the study, the researchers met families across North America, study co-author Selin Gülgöz, a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Psychology at the University of Washington, told Newsweek. They spoke to children and parents about the former’s gender identity. That included showing kids toys and asking which ones they preferred, and quizzing them on how similar they felt to boys or girls. The cisgender control group followed the same steps.

“The most surprising finding is, […]

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